By Terry Dean
God is not against His people having money. He has never been against it in spite of what you may have heard many preachers say. He is against money having them and ruling their lives. Remember this. Money is a great servant, but it is a horrible master.
“Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”
Matthew 6:31-33
You are to be seeking first the kingdom of God and then God promises that all these “things” will be added unto you. What kind of things is he talking about? He’s talking about all the things the Gentiles seek! He is talking about food, drink, clothing, and all the other things the Gentiles are seeking. He has promised to take care of you as long as you put His kingdom first place in your life.
God has always taken care of His chosen people as long as they put Him first in their lives. The Bible is full of examples we can go to and show God’s will for our lives and the wealth He desires to provide for us. Notice I used the term wealth. He doesn’t desire to just give us enough to get barely by. He desires to take abundant care of us if we let Him.
Throughout the Old Testament God often used the name of El Shaddai for Himself…“The God Who Is More Than Enough.” He never called himself “El Cheapo” or “The God of Barely Getting By.” He is the God of MORE than enough. He is the God of Too Much.
“Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.”
Psalms 23:5
He wants to prepare a feast for us in the presence of our enemies. You may have heard that refers to heaven, but it can’t. You don’t have any enemies in heaven. Your enemies are here including Satan and his demons. God wants to provide you with a feast right in front of them where they can see you.
Even better, God says that “my cup runneth over.” In other words, God wants to fill up your cup and just keep right on pouring. Take a glass out of your cupboard. Put it on the counter and start pouring water into it. Pour it right to the top and keep right on pouring. You’ll make a mess all over the place. It will pour all over the counter and start dripping onto the floor. That is how God wants to bless you. He wants to bless you so much that it fills up everything you can take and it starts pouring all over everyone around you.
Let’s give another example to show you this isn’t an isolated incident. It is God’s way of doing things.
“Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.”
Malachi 3:10
God is promising to pour out a blessing that there is not enough room to receive it all. Does that sound like God wants to provide you with just enough to barely get by? No way! He wants to provide you with way more than enough. He wants to give you abundance so you have more than enough to share with and meet the needs of all those around you.
“Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,”
Ephesians 3:20
God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all we can ask or even think. And if you’re like me, you can think about a lot! God says He can do more than you can even think. So you can’t outthink God for your life. His plan for you is already bigger than you can imagine. It is bigger than you can conceive of right now.
“Exceeding” means, “over, above, beyond, very chiefest, exceeding.” “Abundantly above” is “huperekchuno” in the Greek and means, “to pour out over, overflow.” God wants to go beyond overflowing your cup in this verse. In the Old Testament God wanted to provide overflowing blessings to His people. Now in our New Covenant God wants to go exceedingly beyond overflowing your cup!
We are in a New Covenant that God has established upon better promises than the Old Covenant. God wants to go far beyond what He did for His Old Testament saints for you. There is only one problem…Ephesians 3:20 above says,“it is according to the power that works in US.” It is up to us to let Him work. God is limited to what you allow Him to do in your life.
Let’s take that one step further. God is limited to what you allow Him to do THROUGH you. You are His hands on this earth. He is limited to what you allow Him to do through you as His hands.
That is the key. God wants to bless you exceedingly abundantly to more than overflowing, but He is limited in your life by what you allow Him to do through you. He does not work apart from you. Jesus is the head of the church and we are the body. The head does not accomplish anything without the body taking action. The head gives direction and the body follows that direction.
What if your own natural body decided it didn’t want to listen to the head anymore? What if you woke up one morning and told your body to get out of bed, but it decided it was on strike and wasn’t going to listen anymore. You’d be stuck there paralyzed. Well, that is where much of the church world has been. God has given directions about our finances, but we haven’t been paying attention and have been laying there paralyzed.
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Terry Dean shares the truth about how God gives us the power to get wealth by sharing His wisdom with us every day. Terry went from over $50,000 in debt delivering pizzas for a living to being totally debt free and living in financial freedom. Find out more today
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